Posted
by
Soulskill
on Wednesday August 28, 2013 @02:44PM
from the pendulum-swinging-hard dept.

C0R1D4N writes "A New Jersey Appeals Court has ruled that both sides of a texting conversation which resulted in a car accident could be held liable. The ruling came as part of a case in which the driver of a truck received a text message shortly before striking a motorcycle carrying two passengers. The court ruled that while in this case, the person sending the text wasn't liable, they could be if the circumstances were a little different. '...a person sending text messages has a duty not to text someone who is driving if the texter knows, or has special reason to know, the recipient will view the text while driving.'"

The radio station I listen to has kind of sort of begun to acknowledge people listen to morning radio mostly during commute. Instead of "call in at 555-5555 or text to #" it's now "call in at 555-555 or text if you're not moving to #"

The end result is probably nothing more than the DJs feeling like they can sleep a little better at night.

I think that the punchline is " if the texter knows, or has special reason to know, the recipient will view the text while driving."

Merely sending a text message, or making a phone call, or being a talkative passenger, or something, is not a problem. Only doing so with knowledge (how this would be obtained is unclear, and the situation is hypothetical) that the driver will be distracted by your action is seen as problematic.

It's irrelevant; because the hypothetical proposes a fairly stiff standard of evidence to meet (and would only kick in when both that standard is met and a text-reading driver does something unpleasant enough to get the courts involved); but it's actually not dissimilar from reasoning in other contexts:

Bringing a delicious peanut butter sandwich to work for lunch is totally innocuous. Doing so with the full knowledge that Bob from Accounting is lethally allergic is...not. Few scenarios are as clear cut as 'prior knowledge of atypical and dangerous allergy'; but it's hardly unreasonable to expect that certain people will be specially vulnerable to certain agents, and that people who know that and expose them anyway should be treated as though they intended the consequences that they knew about, rather than the consequences that would have resulted for any random normal person.

Its the drivers duty to turn off their phone and ensure they are not distracted while driving. The responsibility falls on the drivers of the vehicles. If they cannot preform this duty. They should not be driving. We don't even need special rules or laws. Just hold people accountable for when they fuck up. Make it clear to everyone what will happen if you are not responsible.

Suddenly people become more responsible.

Also discourteous irresponsible people should get killed early in life.

Bringing a delicious peanut butter sandwich to work for lunch is totally innocuous. Doing so with the full knowledge that Bob from Accounting is lethally allergic is...not..

What? Sorry, but this is just as nonsensical as the court ruling about knowingly texting someone while they are driving. This is about the continued abdication of personal responsibility. When you get behind the wheel of a car, anything you do is your responsibility.

but this is just as nonsensical as the court ruling about knowingly texting someone while they are driving

Well, if you put it like that, then yeah, the court's decision would be nonsensical. But the court didn't say that. The court said that you share responsibility if you have good reasons to believe the text receiver is not merely driving, but will read the text while driving.

Which is commonsense. You don't get an out for something you initiate simply because the mechanism you're relying upon involves someone else being irresponsible. And the court's not making you solely responsible, but it isn't letting you off the hook either.

This is about personal responsibility. Personal responsibility does not mean blaming one person for the actions of multiple people, it means each person involved stepping up to the plate and taking responsible for their part. If you're texting people knowing they're reading those texts while driving, then you're an irresponsible jerk. The driver's irresponsible too, but you know they're reading those messages, and you're sending the messages anyway. Don't pretend it's got nothing to do with you.

> Well, if you put it like that, then yeah, the court's decision would be nonsensical. But the court didn't say that. The court said that you share responsibility if you have good reasons to believe the text receiver is not merely driving, but will read the text while driving.

You repeating the nonsense doesn't make it any less moronic.

The driver has free will. The driver as moral awareness. The driver is a legal adult. The driver is capable of being in control of himself and the situation.

It's the driver's duty to not do dangerous stupid shit.

You demean all of us when you try to strip people of moral responsibility for their actions. You turn us into something less than human.

The driver in this case was a truck driver, he probably worked for a trucking company. Now, suppose his boss had the habit of texting him 'urgent' information, and that continued employment depending on responding to/acting on those texts.

The driver has free will

. Yep, and his 'free will' choice is now 'ignore the text and lose my job, or look at the text and maybe be in an accident'. I'm guess that one of those outcomes is much more likely than the other - so much for his 'free will'.

The driver has moral awareness

Yep, and probably a big part of that awareness is his responsibility to provide for his family

The driver is capable of being in control of the situation

Which situation is he in control of? The employment situation, or the reading a text situation?

Yes, the driver is responsible for his actions, and NOBODY has claimed otherwise. But what possible reason is there of stripping the bos of HIS moral responsibility for putting the driver in that position (of having to choose between keeping his job and looking at a text) in the first place? THAT is what the judge is getting at, and you have not provided any valid argument against it.

But what possible reason is there of stripping the bos of HIS moral responsibility for putting the driver in that position

Because when you try and make everyone responsible for everything the outcome is nobody is responsible for anything. The next level out is someone is going to suggest the telco can reasonably know if a phone is in a moving vehicle; so how come they failed to hold the messages until the phone was not observed to be traveling at rate a speed beyond a running human?

In your case I could argue the Boss has special reason to if not know at least think the trucker is going to be driving, after all its what he i

> Well, if you put it like that, then yeah, the court's decision would be nonsensical. But the court didn't say that. The court said that you share responsibility if you have good reasons to believe the text receiver is not merely driving, but will read the text while driving.

You repeating the nonsense doesn't make it any less moronic.

The driver has free will. The driver as moral awareness. The driver is a legal adult. The driver is capable of being in control of himself and the situation.

It's the driver's duty to not do dangerous stupid shit.

You demean all of us when you try to strip people of moral responsibility for their actions. You turn us into something less than human.

Everything you say about the driver applies to you, too. If you know that the other person is driving a car then why are you continuing to text them? Yes, you could send them a text that says, when you get home, call (or whatever), but the moment they respond and you respond back, you are now a willing participant in their distraction.

I don't view this a stripping people of moral responsibility, but just the opposite. Just like you shouldn't text and drive, if you know somebody is driving, don't text them

It is illegal for a 16 year old to drink, but nobody would argue that offering one a beer doesn't make you liable because the 16 year old has free will and could refuse the beer. Likewise, the court is saying doing something you know is wrong makes you liable.

I dislike this example. How about this:

It is illegal for a person (call him Fred) to drink while driving, but nobody would argue that giving Fred (who is over 21) sealed beer to take home with him with the intent of him drinking them later, and then Fred choosing to drink the beer while in the car on the way makes you liable.

It's almost a perfect analogy of the original scenario, and it shows how this DOES in fact, strip the actual person responsible of their moral responsibility. If only we could just bubble wrap every surface so thickly that no one ever gets hurt, ever.

but this is just as nonsensical as the court ruling about knowingly texting someone while they are driving

Well, if you put it like that, then yeah, the court's decision would be nonsensical. But the court didn't say that. The court said that you share responsibility if you have good reasons to believe the text receiver is not merely driving, but will read the text while driving.

Which is commonsense. You don't get an out for something you initiate simply because the mechanism you're relying upon involves someone else being irresponsible. And the court's not making you solely responsible, but it isn't letting you off the hook either.... If you're texting people knowing they're reading those texts while driving, then you're an irresponsible jerk. The driver's irresponsible too, but you know they're reading those messages, and you're sending the messages anyway. Don't pretend it's got nothing to do with you.

No... it's still utter nonsense. No matter what a texter does, they cannot force you to pick up the phone.

It's like saying that a cute girl is responsible for your bad driving because she is walking down the road in the summer wearing shorts and a bikini top looking hot. Based on the logic above, she would hold some responsibility simply because she knows that guys would be driving down the road looking at her, causing accidents.

No one in their right mind would hold the girl responsible, in whole or in part, for your actions or any accidents caused by your actions. The same applies to people texting you. No one in their right mind would expect you to reply to their texts while driving, even if they knew that you were. They would expect you to find a safe place to pull over. It's your responsibility to drive safely and no one can force you to text back while driving....

"Driver alledges his dispatcher told him to answer the phone even while driving and he did so, claiming this led to the accident. Company has written records of disciplining some driver employees for not immediately answering phone calls, and ex-employees are available to testify that this was cited by their management in termination. Preliminary investigation showed dispatcher and management did not know the laws of the state where the acccident occurred re. cell phone use. Dispatcher and other management had signed statements on record with their insuror stating they educated their drivers in all applicable state and local laws as part of regular training, and in fact were given a discount on insurance prices for their internal safety program."
That's not a hypothetical - that's settled case law. That's two independent lines of proof, either of which would probably have resulted in the same court decision by itself. The company in question paid millions for both the settlement and in fines by the time the whole matter was over.

Most people consider text messaging to be asynchronous communication to be responded to when the receiver is able. The only occasion I can think of where the sender ought to be liable is if they were the driver's employer and required the driver to respond quickly.

If i want to bring a peanut butter sandwich to work with full knowledge that Bob from accounting is allergic, the only reasonable action i must take is to make sure that I don't purposely expose Bob my delicious sandwich. If i get into an argument with Bob and be punches me in the face and steals my lunch and proceeds to wolf it down in front of me, i am not responsible for his actions.

Bringing a delicious peanut butter sandwich to work for lunch is totally innocuous. Doing so with the full knowledge that Bob from Accounting is lethally allergic is...not.

I can't be held accountable if Bob steals my lunch, then eats it.

Apparently you can in Joisey

You would be wrong, even in Joisey. It depends on if you have been warned. If Bob has a deadly allergy to peanuts and even the slightest contact is enough to trigger a lethal attack and (this is the important part) the employees in the office have been notified of the problem and that they are not to bring peanut butter onto the premises, you can be held accountable.

While I don't know of any cases involving peanut butter, there are plenty involving perfume and cologne where an employee is allergic to strong

While I don't know of any cases involving peanut butter, there are plenty involving perfume and cologne where an employee is allergic to strong smells from these substances and other employees are prohibited from using them at the workplace (or even teachers if a student has the condition). Violation of the prohibition costs one their job. By definition, if you lose your job for bringing the banned substance to work because of an allergy another employee has, you are in fact being held accountable [for your

My wife suffers from Celiac Disease; essentially, she's highly allergic to all forms of gluten, be it from wheat, barley, malt, what-have-you. Not deathly allergic, but pretty damn close. Say what you want, but until you've spent 2-3 days shitting and vomiting almost non-stop from something as simple as accidentally ingesting a small amount of bread or taking a sip of a malt, you have no idea what she deals with and should subsequently shut your fucking mouth.

Anyway, we understand that her condition is our problem, not anyone else's, and thus she pretty much keeps it to herself as she's not a completely narcissistic bitch. I.e., "people like you."

P.S. "Rights," whether real or perceived, have nothing to do with it - nobody is responsible for your health or safety but yourself.

The "lowest common denominator" is the vocal minority who feel their "right" to bring a peanut butter sandwich or wear a particular fragrance to work outweighs the rights of others to come to work without fear of developing an illness,

Hate to point this out, but if you've got a serious peanut allergy, you've already got an illness. Ditto if you die when you run across a whiff of perfume.

I suppose you'd have no problem with demanding that all your normal employees go through a sterile scrubdown and take broad spectrum antibiotics so you could employ someone with a failed immune system, too. Better to try to modify the general environment for everyone than to keep those who need special environments to stay alive in their own.

I happen to be allergic to something that someone wears or uses at work. Last week, I had to spend some time outside, because they walked by my office, and I started sneezing constantly.

I have no idea who it is, or what it is. Since it doesn't last all day, I assume it's someone reapplying their stink.

I mentioned it in conversation with one of the executive's assistants. Well, because I was sitting outside sounding like I had a nasty cold that cleared up in about 15 minutes. They told me all I had to do was complain and they'd reinforce the policy against perfumes. I told them I won't complain, and would address it with the person directly if I ever find who it is.

I was already able to definitely track one stink. It was room air freshener that someone used. I had suspicions. It was confirmed when I walked back into my office and started sneezing just a couple minutes after they had sprayed it. They still use it, but sparingly, and that doesn't make me sneeze. Problem solved. No official paperwork, and no hard feelings.:)

It's a whole different situation. If I bring a peanut butter sandwich to work, then I'm directly responsible for putting my colleague in danger. However, if I'm sending a text message to someone I know is driving, then my sending that text message is in no way directly responsible for whatever accident may happen due to the driver picking up the phone and reading the text message. The big difference is that the driver still has a choice here. It's the driver that makes the choice to check the text message. He isn't forced to. Your allergic colleague doesn't have the choice of being exposed to peanut butter or not (assuming this is a real, terrible case of peanut butter allergy) and has no real way of avoiding the consequences.

Agreed. If allergies are that bad then you already need to be on guard at all times as any surface in a public place could contain trace amounts of peanuts which could in turn be transferred to the counters at work.

People are increasingly that allergic to all sorts of things. Are you saying that if I have some communicable disease that you could die from, you should live in a bubble? Because allergies are just the immune system reacting to a perceived hostile substance.

A better analogy would be a case where everyone but you was a carrier of a disease and you were the only person in the area who could suffer severe adverse affects from it... like if your immune system was destroyed.

I have been wondering for some time now why peanut allergies are virtually unknown in China and were unknown in The Netherlands until say, 15 years ago. Now, it's every third kid that has a pretty dangerous allergy. And it's not a case of overdiagnosing either.

My hypothesis is that while crop growers are very good at hardening the fruits and vegetables against disease and insects, they forget (or rather: ignore) the fact that the reason fruit and vegetables are resistant is because they are using a frightful array of chemical defenses. And those defenses include proteins, most of them not being analyzed since we're talking "harmless and healthy vegetables". I think that if we'd analyze the chemical defenses in the current crops really carefully, we'd probably discover some nasty surprises.

And I agree that it sounds as if US schools are overreacting horribly. Noone will choke to death from touching a peanut butter sandwhich. They won't like it (blisters will likely occur), but that will just teach 'em not to touch places where peanut butter sandwiches have been. But don't blame the kids with allergies for the way your school "handles" this problem. Although this does depend on the age of the kids. At age 3-, you can't expect the kids to take care of this issue themselves. At age 10, I sure as hell expect kids to watch out what they put in their mouth.

I have been wondering for some time now why peanut allergies are virtually unknown in China and were unknown in The Netherlands until say, 15 years ago. Now, it's every third kid that has a pretty dangerous allergy. And it's not a case of overdiagnosing either.

My hypothesis is that while crop growers are very good at hardening the fruits and vegetables against disease and insects, they forget (or rather: ignore) the fact that the reason fruit and vegetables are resistant is because they are using a frightful array of chemical defenses. And those defenses include proteins, most of them not being analyzed since we're talking "harmless and healthy vegetables". I think that if we'd analyze the chemical defenses in the current crops really carefully, we'd probably discover some nasty surprises.

And I agree that it sounds as if US schools are overreacting horribly. Noone will choke to death from touching a peanut butter sandwhich. They won't like it (blisters will likely occur), but that will just teach 'em not to touch places where peanut butter sandwiches have been. But don't blame the kids with allergies for the way your school "handles" this problem. Although this does depend on the age of the kids. At age 3-, you can't expect the kids to take care of this issue themselves. At age 10, I sure as hell expect kids to watch out what they put in their mouth.

That could be, but more likely it isn't the case. I agree that it isn't overdiagnosing, either, but it is just better diagnosing. People have many allergies, very few lead to anaphylactic shock. I for one am allergic to peanuts and yet I eat them all the time and enjoy peanut butter. There is a difference between having an allergy and having a life threatening allergy. Today, kids get test routinely for allergies. As such, they are now diagnosed as having these allergies, whereas previous you would only get tested if you were having actual allergy problems. Most people are allergic to a myriad of things. If the symptoms are problematic you take allergy pills. If the symptoms are deadly, you avoid the source all together and carry an epi pen just in case.

Probably the reason you don't hear of many peanut allergies in China is that like the US, most people do not have a serious allergy to them but unlike the US, most Chinese people don't get the medical care and testing that occurs in the US to determine if they are even mildly allergic.

People vastly overreact to the threat of peanuts. My little sister is extremely allergic to peanuts and has been since she was a child. So allergic that a peanut touching her skin raises a welt. She grew up in a house where 6 other people ate peanut butter all the time like it was liquid crack. The real stuff, too - Teddy - not that Jiff or Skippy hydrogenated junk. She went to public school. She lives a normal life, but with an Epipen in her purse. As with damn near everything else a vocal minority have created a huge scare over something that while potentially deadly is easily avoidable.

Noone will choke to death from touching a peanut butter sandwhich. They won't like it (blisters will likely occur), but that will just teach 'em not to touch places where peanut butter sandwiches have been. But don't blame the kids with allergies for the way your school "handles" this problem. Although this does depend on the age of the kids. At age 3-, you can't expect the kids to take care of this issue themselves. At age 10, I sure as hell expect kids to watch out what they put in their mouth.

Objection: A good many people absolutely can die within minutes from just touching what amounts to peanut dust. I work with someone like that and I've seen it personally.

Make it illegal to send a text if you know the recipient is driving. Now you gotta prove to a court of law that the sender knew. But it's easy to prove the driver was texting by checking phone records. But no, we don't want to do that, because it would imply making it illegal to text while driving.

Make it illegal to send a text if you know the recipient is driving. Now you gotta prove to a court of law that the sender knew. But it's easy to prove the driver was texting by checking phone records. But no, we don't want to do that, because it would imply making it illegal to text while driving.

Many places have already made it illegal to text while driving. They are just existing the liability to the other party of the conversation when that party has knowingly participated in the illegal texting, at the very least as an accessory to the crime itself.

Despite the fact that the sender has no real way of knowing if the recipient is operating a vehicle unless they are in the vehicle with them, and on top of that, the text is a non-time sensitive communication like a physical letter. The only reason to read it the moment you get it is because you want to, otherwise you just wait until it's convenient, nobody is in any way forcing you to read it now.

As to the morons in NJ, they said "...know, the recipient will view the text while driving". I guess the statement of "I didn't know he/she was stupid enough to text while driving." suddenly becomes a valid defense.

Make it illegal to send a text if you know the recipient is driving. Now you gotta prove to a court of law that the sender knew. But it's easy to prove the driver was texting by checking phone records. But no, we don't want to do that, because it would imply making it illegal to text while driving.

Many places have already made it illegal to text while driving. They are just existing the liability to the other party of the conversation when that party has knowingly participated in the illegal texting, at the very least as an accessory to the crime itself.

Just because I send someone a text message doesn't mean that I'm forcing them to read it while driving. I'll often text my wife when I know she's driving home because I want to send it to her before *I* start driving. Something like "Hey sweetie, after your aerobics class can you pick up milk at the store?" or "I'm going to the gym after work so I'll be home late, go ahead and eat dinner without me".

I don't need or expect her to read the SMS's while she's driving, so why should I be responsible if she does?

OTOH if you call somebody who's driving you can hear the car, etc., you can usually tell if they're driving or not. Making it illegal not to hang up if you know somebody is driving would make more sense.

Making it illegal not to hang up if you know somebody is driving would make more sense.

No it wouldn't. You fall into the same logic trap as the Jersey judge thinking that more laws/liability will fix human behavior that we don't like. It's already illegal to text and drive in my state, and every day I see at least 3 drivers on my four mile work commute doing it. Every other driver is talking on the phone at 5:00 during their drive home.

Does anybody seriously think the answer to all life's problems is more laws? Must we always advocate yet another statute on the books every time we see something we don't agree with or don't like? Maybe we need to just grow up and realize we are never going to live in a perfect world where nothing bad happens.

One issue I have with text records is that my phone will keep trying to send the message until it gets signal. So I can type and hit Send while still in a convenience store, but it might not actually send until I'm 30 miles down the road to an area with better reception. I would presume that records would show when it was actually sent, not when it was typed out. Given that most areas of the country have spotty reception due to even small topographic features or because people use Sprint, it's a less unlikely scenario than it might seem.

To be fair there is gonna be plenty of times when you are gonna "have a special reason to know" the person you are texting is driving. For example the drummer for my band has a day job which involves driving a long distance to work so i know not to call him for at least 2 hours after his shift ends otherwise he is likely to get my call during his commute so by this ruling if I ignored the fact that I know what hours he works I would be at least partially responsible.

I think the interesting question is what do they expect to do if one of the persons (i.e either the texter or textee) is in a state where texting while driving is accepted?
Will I still be fined for sending a text to Bob who I know is driving, but he's in a state where it is legal to text while driving?
And what if I send text to Bob who is driving in NJ, but I'm in a state where it is legal?
Will they turn it into a federal case based on some perverted interpretation of interstate commerce?

Even so. I should be able to send a text to a driver even if I know for sure he is driving at that time. A text message can be left alone until it is safe to read it, and the responsibility of waiting to read the message until it can be done safely is 100â... the responsibility of the recipient.

In most situations I would completely agree with you. But In the particular case of your boss/dispatcher/etc texting you there is quite possibly an employer-created set of perverse incentives, in which case the employer should be liable for willfully creating a hazardous work environment:Do you pull over to respond? Or does that cut into your performance or compensation metrics?Do you wait until you would stop anyway for a delivery/service call/whatever? Or does that make you "nonresponsive" and hurt your

by that same argument you would have to ban all time based performance metrics for any commercial drivers, since they would encourage speeding. At some point you have to let the driver be responsible for complying with the law.

Would seem that any action that distracts a driver would then be fair game. Called someone you know on their mobile phone? Even the simple act of them having to reach for the phone, or put their bluetooth headset one, or (heck) even press the answer button on their in-dash system could be argued by a lawyer to have caused a distraction.
And what's next? Can I be liable simply for waiving at someone from the sidewalk? After all, they may have to turn their head to see who it was that was waiving, and next thing you know.... BLAM!
sigh.
I sure do love living in NJ at times.

It does seem like we're trying to shift the blame. The driver does not have to read the text or answer the phone. In fact, the driver can easily disable the wireless on their phone while driving or take other steps so that they won't even know someone is trying to reach them. Plenty of people can argue that they NEED to know if someone is calling them, but let's be realistic: of all of the drivers on the road with cell phones, how many actually NEED to know about a text/call the very moment it happens? A ma

While I disagree that this is that big a deal, especially in light of the evidence that the people who get in accidents with cell phones get in just as many accidents without them (gee what is the common link there?) which seriously makes me think that the whole issue is a matter of not recognizing the inherent self-selection in accident statistics than anything.....

aside from that, this is essentially the same argument I used to make when people would be concerned about me occasionally turning off the ringer on my phone or leaving it somewhere so as not to bother me.

Mom: "What if there was an emergency and your grandmother got hurt?"Me: "Then you should call the hospital, I am not an ambulance, and have no medical training; I likely can't help."

As if me not knowing the very moment someone died or was seriously injured was somehow important. Yes I may only find out hours later. Yes I may miss the opportunity to see them alive one more time.... no I don' lose any sleep over it.

It's really common sense: if you know your buddy is kind of a dumbass about such things, don't text him when you know he's driving. I already have people I apply this rule to.

No, it's not... It doesn't matter if he is a dumbass or not. You are not legally responsible for his behavior. He is.

I applaud your efforts at being a good friend but, in my opinion, that does not diminish his personal legal responsibility to operate a car in a safe manner in any way. Nor does that transfer his legal responsibility to you.

It would apply. If your running a trucking company then you will have procedures for calling your truckers. If those procedures don't involve hands free equipment then the trucking company would be liable. The judge just left wiggle room so a different judge can use common sense.

Do you have reading comprehension problems? It's about whether the person knew the recipient was in an unsafe environment.

Let's say you see your friend crossing the street and a big mac truck bearing down on her. If you holler her name from her 5, forcing her to stop and turn her view away from danger and towards you, then yes, you're an idiot and should be blamed.

I know it's hard for a lot of the whiny babies to understand, but eventually we all have to accept responsability for everything we've played a

Would seem that any action that distracts a driver would then be fair game.

Yes. If and only if, your actions were negligent (or worse) in doing so. Negligence requires that your actions be a proximate cause of the harm and that the results be reasonably foreseeable.

In the hypothetical laid out by the judge, if you knew the person (a) was a driving AND (b) had a propensity to recklessly respond to messages, then you in fact would bear some responsibility for calling someone with those properties in spite of the known risk in doing so. That is, unless the cost of not contacting t

The whole point of text messages is to allow for asynchronous communications with someone. Texting someone while they're driving is one of the best times to do it because it means they can get back to you whenever they're done. It's the driver's fault completely for looking at the text. Could you blame Facebook for pushing an update to your phone while you're driving if you looked at it and crashed?

I was going to post something similar to what you wrote, then I thought about it further.

Say you're not only texting someone, but you're actively engaged in a bidirectional conversation over SMS, whilst knowing they are driving. E.g. recipient responds to you "I'm driving right now, but what do you need?". If you text them back, then you a) Know they're driving and reading/responding to SMSs, b) Choosing to exacerbate this situation you know is illegal and dangerous.

'...a person sending text messages has a duty not to text someone who is driving if the texter knows, or has special reason to know, the recipient will view the text while driving.'"

Texting someone while they're driving is one of the best times to do it because it means they can get back to you whenever they're done. It's the driver's fault completely for looking at the text.

The law doesn't look at this that way, and the judge is basing his opinion squarely within long-standing legal precident. However you want to classify the behavior, the judge still has a strongly defensible position, legally.

Let's say that you're robbing a store after hours and you know your friend brought a gun. You didn't though, for whatever reason. During the robbery, a security guard shows up. He shoots at you and your friend -- your friend shoots back, killing the guard. You are liable for his death. Yet you weren't armed and in fact, were only shot at. The courts reason that because you had knowledge of the gun ahead of time, you could reasonably foresee its use, and by not stopping your friend you were complicit in allowing it to happen. Say hello to thirty years. Look up felony manslaughter for a more detailed description. Your mere knowledge of that gun is what turned simple robbery into felony manslaughter. If you hadn't known, you wouldn't be ordinarily liable in most jurisdictions.

The law is quite clear on this point: If you have knowledge of illegal activity, regardless of your own intent, etc. and fail to act you're just as guilty as the person who did it. In fact, if the other person has diminished capacity, or extenuating circumstances, you could even face a harsher penalty than they will -- simply by knowing what's going on! You weren't involved at all, but you're the one heading to the slammer.

Yes, this is "just" a cell phone, but legally, it's no different than it being "just" a beer. If you let someone drive home drunk, and they kill someone, there's some guys in blue uniforms outside that want to talk to you. This judge is saying a cell phone is no different, as a legal instrument.

An example that would fit is that you know your friend bought a gun legally. That is the end of your knowledge. Suddenly the Police show up because your friend committed armed robbery. You were implicated because you had knowledge of the gun, and no knowledge of the crime.

An even better example would be this. You know your friend bought a motorcycle. The police show up and arrest you because your friend committed vehicular homicide.

Other scenarios that are no more stupid than texting-a-driver-is-illegal.1) A text makes someone not pull out on time. The texter now owes child support.2) A text causes someone to forget to clarify no mayo on their double bacon burger. The texter must now pay for liposuction.3) A text distracts someone from their last minute bid on eBay. Texter must now provide that limited edition, gold plated John Lennon semen.4) A text distracts an AC for precious seconds, making their First Post the fifth or sixth one

How, generally speaking, would the sender necessarily know that the recipient is driving at the time? I'm not saying it can't happen, but it would seem to me to be quite far removed from the general rule.

For someone who agrees with his overall point, it missed your head by a mile or two. Try looking up the definition of 'asynchronous'.

His point is that the sender may know someone is driving but expect that driver to show reasonable judgement before reading or responding. Simply knowing someone is driving shouldn't hold the sender liable. My wife sends me text messages frequently while I'm driving, but that doesn't mean I whip out my phone to check it immediately upon alert.

My wife sends me text messages frequently while I'm driving, but that doesn't mean I whip out my phone to check it immediately upon alert.

My wife and I have had this argument...

Wife: "Why didn't you answer my text?"Me: "I was only a few blocks from the house."Wife: "Why do you need a cell phone if you don't read your texts."Me: "Fine next time I'll respond as I'm walking the door instead of actually talking to you."

A bit more info, our state supreme court is pretty awful and was one of the major issues in our 09 gubernatorial debate. Not that anything much was actually done about it.
The idea though is if one of the texts is "I am driving" and you keep replying you are liable. It is still an awful ruling but at least they dont expect you to have ESP

actually, I prefer getting voice calls while driving to text messages, because I can't respond to the latter while driving, while my car has bluetooth, so I can answer an incoming call effectively hands-free with just a single button press, which is located on the steering column.

There will likely never be a situation where the non-driving texter can be held responsible. Burden of proof will always be on the plaintiff, and proving that the non-driver knew that the driver would read his or her texts while driving will almost always be a legal impossibility. And, in that case, this makes about as much sense as holding a passenger in the car liable if they were being purposefully distracting or disruptive (IMO: perfectly valid).

There will likely never be a situation where the non-driving texter can be held responsible. Burden of proof will always be on the plaintiff, and proving that the non-driver knew that the driver would read his or her texts while driving will almost always be a legal impossibility. And, in that case, this makes about as much sense as holding a passenger in the car liable if they were being purposefully distracting or disruptive (IMO: perfectly valid).

I would think companies may be the most at risk for being held liable. Not that is anything new since they usually are liable for employee actions while working anyway. IANAL, but I see this could mean that if they text someone going home from work and they get into an accident they may be held liable; or even if tehy have written policies against texting while driving if they send a text they could not point to the policy as a possible defense. I would imagine it would be harder to hold a family member or

There will likely never be a situation where the non-driving texter can be held responsible. Burden of proof will always be on the plaintiff, and proving that the non-driver knew that the driver would read his or her texts while driving will almost always be a legal impossibility. And, in that case, this makes about as much sense as holding a passenger in the car liable if they were being purposefully distracting or disruptive (IMO: perfectly valid).

I think it's a stupid law, but that's just not true. There have been lots of times I got a text message while driving, replied "sry drvn" at a red light, and then got several more messages in the next 60 seconds from the same person. I don't think I've EVER had someone text me while I was behind the wheel and NOT replied with that string, honestly... perhaps a few times when I was having a dialog trying to figure out where someone was, but in that case, the fact that I'm driving is obvious to the other pa

That is one of the worst ideas I've ever heard. It's up to the driver to not check his or her phone well driving, thats it. It doesn't matter if people are texting you, calling you or even trying to IM you, just don't pick up the phone. This is another example of the pass the buck system of law making. Lets not make any one person responsible for being irresponsible and immature, lets make everyone deal with the fact no one has grown up.

Wouldn't this same logic apply to the thousands of roadside bulletin boards (advertisements) along New Jersey roadways? Some of which are getting extremely out of hand and distracting with full color animated displays...

There are always distractions when you are driving. It is up to each driver to focus on the task of driving their vehicle. If the driver decides to prioritize something else like answering a phone, texting, reading a book, watching a movie, adjusting the stereo, or any one of another million possibilities it is up to them to do so in a safe manner.

By this logic, you could also be held responsible for an accident after emailing, tweeting or mentioning someone in a Facebook status while they're driving. Come to think of it, phoning someone while they're driving (even if they have handsfree) could be construed as deliberate distraction, as could texting a passenger with important news that might interest the driver. This is bonkers; you can't control how and when someone else uses their phone, nor should you be responsible for their poor choices while

For this to happen, we would need to change our whole judicial view point which requires intent (mens rea). Either that, or negligence needs to become so broad that everyone is a criminal all the time. Negligence requires a common sense factor that you knew ahead of time that something could happen. Yelling "Fire" is a great example of the application in a sane system. Unfortunately we have not been sane for quite some time.

Oh, and I guess FCC emergency broadcasts that hit your phone like the recent CA

I use textsecure on my phone, and I have now and will continue to maintain that texting CAN be done safely while driving, and that most of the problem with it is based on strawman arguments based on how long a person COULD spend or how long average people spend staring at the phone rather than watching the road.

In no way, of course, would I say that all drivers who text do so safely or even that the majority do, just that nobody has yet shown that it has to be unsafe, or even that it is a significant issue

Dunno what happened to it? If you take it from my tone that this was a self control issue, it wasn't, I had no intention to stop texting while driving because I don't see it as inherently dangerous. Nor talking on the phone.

I am pretty convinced that the majority of the issue is the inability of people to recognize the inherent self selection bias in accident data.

Driver: "Yo, dude, I'm headed your way. In my car. Driving it myself. Alone. Tell me where you're at so I can pick you up".Non-driver: I'd better not send a response since I know my friend is driving and sending a text might be a distraction.

Driver sends multiple texts to non-driver:

Driver: "C'mon man, answer me!"Driver: "Why don't you ANSWER!!!?"Driver: "WTF!!!! I will spam u with texts until you tell me where you are!!!".Driver: "U R M8king me crzy!!! Answer!!!".Driver: Runs over child at school crossing

Lawyer to non-driver: "Why didn't you respond? You clearly knew Driver would continue to text while driving until you responded. If only you had responded, the driver would have put down the phone and driven safely to your location. You are responsible for the accident because you did not take sufficient measures to ensure the driver would stop texting!"

The summary is about half the length of your post, and yet still answers every question you have. The texter is only liable if they are told or reason to know the text will be viewed specifically while driving.